- An amendment to the crypto provision of the America COMPETES Act will be proposed
- The amendment loosens the grip that the Treasury would have had over crypto entities
- The amendment will be voted on later this week
The cryptocurrency provision of the America COMPETES Act could be loosened thanks to hard work by crypto advocates. Coin Center Executive Jerry Brito announced yesterday that, after campaigning to educate lawmakers on the folly of allowing the Treasury the sweeping powers outlined in the first iteration, a much more reasonable revision had been proposed. The amendment will be voted on later this week, with crypto advocates hopeful that we don’t see a repeat of the Infrastructure Bill debacle.
New Rules Would Have Given Treasury Secretary “Unchecked Discretion”
The America COMPETES Act was proposed last week and, had it passed unchecked, would have allowed the Treasury secretary brand new powers to act against entities he considered to have illegally processed transactions, be it fiat or cryptocurrency.
As Coin Center said at the time, the bill would have handed the Treasury Secretary “unchecked discretion to forbid financial institutions (including cryptocurrency exchanges) from offering their customers access to cryptocurrency networks.”
America COMPETES Act Revision Would be More Reasonable
Brito worked with Connecticut Congressman Jim Himes to re-word the bill to loosen the powers afforded to the Treasury Secretary:
I’m happy to report @jahimes has listened to our voices and looks like the notice and comment protections in the COMPETES Act related to special measures will be retained! This is in a “manager’s amendment” that will be considered later this week. pic.twitter.com/6mAtLD0tF9
— Jerry Brito (@jerrybrito) January 31, 2022
The new policy, had it been enacted, would have removed a number of processes that currently need to be followed before a financial entity can be censured, such as a public rulemaking notice being issued with the restriction before it is enacted and the restriction lifting after 120 days, barring a continuation order by the Treasury Department.
The crypto provision of the America COMPETES Act would have stripped this 120-day expiration as well as the period during which third-parties could comment on proposed action against suspect entities.
The new proposals, called a “manager’s amendment”, will be discussed later this week, where they will hopefully be included into the final bill.
